Somehow Tropico 3 is the first game to push my machine to it's limits. I don't see this game as being designed for people with super high end machines so it seems like it's just not optimized. I turned all the graphics down to medium and it still wont run super smooth.

Besides all that the demo was very amusing and full of style. If the game ran better I'd be much more interested in getting it after a price drop.

I was able to try the demo last night for a little while, it feels very much like Tropico 1 revisited and 3d-sized, minus the awesome music. Still, I have to take a longer look at it, it chugs and hums on my old pc but it seems playable/enjoyable enough.

"Your ship has several rooms dedicated to various functions: weapons, shield, life support, etc. – My favorite is the etc. room"
- doubtingthomas396

I played the second scenario for a 3rd time and really took charge. My treasure peaked at $100,000 and I built at least 1 of every type of building (at least those available in the demo). Every faction was happy with me (more or less) and I had good relations with both the US and USSR.

Certis: Quintin is both smart and attractive.

Fedaykin98: Good lord, I wouldn't have expected brilliance like that from that nemeslut Quintin Stone!

Yonder: It's weird to say this, but Quintin Stone may be the wisest person here.

... It feels very much like Tropico 1 revisited and 3d-sized, minus the awesome music.

I caught a couple of gameplay vids over at YouTube and was struck at how much this resembles a 3-D version of the original game. I'm not sure whether this is a good or bad thing: for me nostalgia will drive a game purchase, but the been-there-done-that feeling relegates it to the closet behind my computer.

I was hoping for a more hands off game. I thought the ideas in Tropico were interesting yet bogged down by the micromanagement of city building sims. I think there is a place for a game like this where you manage the budget and policies and then watch as the city grows without the need to place every building.

In the little I played of Tropico, I spent the whole time trying to build apartments so that the people would be happy and barely being able to do that. If the game is yet another version of the city building sim as your impressions seem to suggest, I'll pass.

The demo really piqued my interest, and I went and downloaded Tropico 1 and 2 off Steam over the weekend to catch up. Am anticipating the launch, but I wonder if this will get covered up during the big fall release season.

I didn't like Tropico 2. The whole pirate theme didn't really gel for me. I am glad they went back to the original cold-warish setting.

PandaEskimo wrote:

I was hoping for a more hands off game. I thought the ideas in Tropico were interesting yet bogged down by the micromanagement of city building sims. I think there is a place for a game like this where you manage the budget and policies and then watch as the city grows without the need to place every building.

In the little I played of Tropico, I spent the whole time trying to build apartments so that the people would be happy and barely being able to do that. If the game is yet another version of the city building sim as your impressions seem to suggest, I'll pass.

I think it'd be interesting to see a more hands off version, but I'd be curious as to how they would keep the player engaged throughout the course of the game.

In a world gone mad, only a lunatic is truly insane.Steam|Twitter|PSN:Lucky_Wilbury

In the little I played of Tropico, I spent the whole time trying to build apartments so that the people would be happy and barely being able to do that. If the game is yet another version of the city building sim as your impressions seem to suggest, I'll pass.

I can't say I blame you -- I got burnt out on Sim City 4. Then again, that was a few years ago, and I feel the urge returning.

The latest on Tropico is a hands-on over at Gamespot. A warning, though: The only thing the Gamespot writer apparently got his hands on was the company press release and a couple of already-released screenies.

I can't say I blame you -- I got burnt out on Sim City 4. Then again, that was a few years ago, and I feel the urge returning.

Yeah but that's easy. Sim City 4 does its best to suck the fun out of the game. They designed the game to be an excruciating grind, with razor thin profit margins and very slow growth. The only way I can play it is to use the money cheat.

Tropico 3, on the other hand, keeps bringing me back to the demo. I played Bananas for like the 3rd or 4th time yesterday with yet another dictator. I might just have to pre-order.

Certis: Quintin is both smart and attractive.

Fedaykin98: Good lord, I wouldn't have expected brilliance like that from that nemeslut Quintin Stone!

Yonder: It's weird to say this, but Quintin Stone may be the wisest person here.

I think it'd be interesting to see a more hands off version, but I'd be curious as to how they would keep the player engaged throughout the course of the game.

During my limited time with Tropico 1, maybe 4 or 5 hours, I spent the whole time trying to just get by while spending just a little time managing wages and other planning options. I noticed all the decrees and other things but didn't have time to deal with them since I couldn't build enough apartments to get rid of the shacks.

I think the game could leave the micromanaging optional. There is plenty to do with setting wages, choosing which types of business to deal with, managing factions, managing foreign countries, and sometimes dealing with individual residents. I'd like to be able to set all wages, or a minimum wage, at 5, rent at 3, and hotel fees at 30 without having to click on all the buildings. Maybe the game map could be broken into regions so you could manage at that level. You could build a residential region, a tourist region, and a farming / industry region and set things like police presence, facility maintenance levels, etc. Instead of having to build roads, you could allocate a percentage of the budget to transportation. Isn't this more the level a dictator would govern the city anyway?

I'd like to be able to set all wages, or a minimum wage, at 5, rent at 3, and hotel fees at 30 without having to click on all the buildings.

Tropico 3 does that

FWIW In Tropico 1 believe that holding shift down when clicking on a buildings rent adjusted rent for all buildings of that type. I think the same idea applied to wages. Control may apply the change globally to rent & wages, but I don't remember.

Yeah, in Tropico 3 for any wage display there's an option to set that wage for all workers of that type and another to set it for all workers of that education level (uneducated, high school, college). It's not a minimum though, it sets all of them. For all residences, there's a button to use that rent amount for all buildings of the same type (this includes new ones that are built).

Certis: Quintin is both smart and attractive.

Fedaykin98: Good lord, I wouldn't have expected brilliance like that from that nemeslut Quintin Stone!

Yonder: It's weird to say this, but Quintin Stone may be the wisest person here.

I'd like to be able to set all wages, or a minimum wage, at 5, rent at 3, and hotel fees at 30 without having to click on all the buildings.

Tropico 3 does that

FWIW In Tropico 1 believe that holding shift down when clicking on a buildings rent adjusted rent for all buildings of that type. I think the same idea applied to wages. Control may apply the change globally to rent & wages, but I don't remember.

If you had said, RTFM, I'd reply that I did and that I didn't learn this. Thanks for the info. I might give Tropico 3 a try. Hopefully there is a demo for PS3 / Xbox 360. I get my Xbox back tomorrow, lets see how I did in the refurb lottery.

My biggest issue with these games is feeling like I can never succeed. I can barely push one factor above acceptable, let alone a handful. Does it seem like its possible to succeed in the demo?

My biggest issue with these games is feeling like I can never succeed. I can barely push one factor above acceptable, let alone a handful. Does it seem like its possible to succeed in the demo?

In the PC demo there are two scenarios. I played each around 3 times so far. Out of those 6 runs, I failed like 4 times and either restarted or reloaded from a save, then went on to win. While I felt that the game is challenging, it's neither a cake-walk nor is it oppressively difficult. Failure criteria include: being voted out of office (has not happened to me), rebels kill all your soldiers and destroy your palace (has happened to me once), the USA or USSR invade (happened once, capitalist pig-dogs), a military coup occurs (once), running out of time for the scenario (not happened), and maybe one or two other events I'm forgetting.

You can also customize your El Presidente to match your own particular strengths. Or at least you can in the demo campaign scenarios.

Certis: Quintin is both smart and attractive.

Fedaykin98: Good lord, I wouldn't have expected brilliance like that from that nemeslut Quintin Stone!

Yonder: It's weird to say this, but Quintin Stone may be the wisest person here.

If you had said, RTFM, I'd reply that I did and that I didn't learn this. Thanks for the info. I might give Tropico 3 a try. Hopefully there is a demo for PS3 / Xbox 360. I get my Xbox back tomorrow, lets see how I did in the refurb lottery.

No demo for 360 yet. Don't think it's even slated for release on the PS3.

I, too, hope there's a demo because I don't immediately see how this kind of game will translate gracefully onto a console.

My biggest issue with these games is feeling like I can never succeed. I can barely push one factor above acceptable, let alone a handful. Does it seem like its possible to succeed in the demo?

Given the spirit of the game, I would suggest you to start cheating, being honest never helped a dictator.

Seriously now, I cannot say yet, haven't had the chance to play much of it, you may need to rethink your strategy and explore the possibilities. I'll install the demo on my much faster laptop and try the game more objectively, right now it feels a tad too slow, but I enjoy the humour and thinking behind it so much I can endure the laggish performance I've faced playing so far.

"Your ship has several rooms dedicated to various functions: weapons, shield, life support, etc. – My favorite is the etc. room"
- doubtingthomas396

I'd like to be able to set all wages, or a minimum wage, at 5, rent at 3, and hotel fees at 30 without having to click on all the buildings.

Tropico 3 does that

FWIW In Tropico 1 believe that holding shift down when clicking on a buildings rent adjusted rent for all buildings of that type. I think the same idea applied to wages. Control may apply the change globally to rent & wages, but I don't remember.

In tropico 1, they explained the various ctrl/shift options at the very bottom of the screen when you moused over the wages. It's the same features as the buttons in tropico 3. Ctrl + wage would be for the same type of workers (lumberjacks, farmers, or whatever). The only problem was this level of control wasn't available for hotel fees. even if you selected them all to manual fee (instead of the auto-occupancy rate) you couldn't single click control them all. I didn't have that much of a problem with it because i typically left it on auto.

And is there anything else your avatar does besides boost construction speed and defend during rebel attacks?

In a world gone mad, only a lunatic is truly insane.Steam|Twitter|PSN:Lucky_Wilbury

I've never had a problem with rebels so i don't have to worry about making sure my avatar is there fighting. Well, let me rephrase, I've never had a problem with rebels that ever resulted in a close battle. Always seemed like the government troops just swooped in and wiped out the threat. Its the natural paranoia in me that shines through. I typically always try to get an armory, 3 guard posts, and the base asap. The conscription edict helps incredibly well.

In a world gone mad, only a lunatic is truly insane.Steam|Twitter|PSN:Lucky_Wilbury

After playing through the first level, it seems to be an extremely faithful reproduction of Tropico 1, translated to 3D, and with a few things added, like leader traits and an El Presidente avatar.

I liked Tropico 1, but I always found it subtly annoying, because there's just never enough room. That's obviously a deliberate design goal, but it always felt like an incomplete game to me for that reason, like it didn't ever quite gel properly. There was always this sense of something missing. There was never a feeling of your builds clicking into place and meshing into a greater machine. Version 3 seems unchanged in that regard... the system is "pretty", but it never resonates and reaches real beauty. There's no real sense of a deeper order peeking out.

Maybe I'll pick it up on sale, but I don't think this is a day-1 for me.

They did, however, do a fantastic job on the graphics, so if you were a big T1 fan, you'll probably be pretty impressed with T3.

"I've been playing Rebel Galaxy for the past few days. It has made me appreciate every other game in the genre more." -- Flintheart Glomgold

When your demo game 'ends', re: you complete the objective or run out of time, save your game, then reload... you'll be abled to keep playing the game! Hotkeying various 'disabled' buildings will also allow you to build them, provided you meet the requirements.